DK Eyewitness Gandhi is a spectacular and informative guide to one of history's most complex and revered personalities. Striking photographs offer you a unique view of Mahatma Gandhi's legacy, tracing his life from his early childhood to his assassination, highlighting his affirmation as a leader, his involvement in Indian Independence and his timeless ideas about world peace.

Friday, May 8, 2015

Hind Swaraj - Its Relevance Today

By T. S. Ananthu

The quintessence of Gandhi's thinking was contained in his little booklet Hind Swaraj. Its import is so revolutionary, so different from what most of us are used to, that a real paradigm shift is a basic pre-requisite to grasping what he had in mind. That is why even close followers and admirers of his, such as Jawaharlal Nehru, just could not stomach what he had said in Hind Swaraj.The most important thing that Gandhi conveyed through this booklet is a meaning to Swaraj which is totally removed from the political context in which we normally understand this concept. He looked at the root meaning of the word Swaraj = Swa+Raj, that is apne ooper raj. As he explained in his booklet: Real home rule is self-rule or self-control.1 In other words, for him Swaraj stood for our taking control of ourselves, freeing ourselves from the slavery to the mind and its desires. As he explained, the way to it is the awakening of the soul- force or love-force which frees us from the ‘I’-ness of the mind. Thus, his concept of Swaraj is very different from, and in many ways diametrically opposite of, the 'independence' that we Indians celebrate on every 15th Aug.

Tuesday, May 5, 2015

Gandhian Economics : The need of the times

By Dr. Sameer G. Thakur

Mahatma Gandhi's views on Economics have been largely ignored by mainstream economists and leaders, even in India. This paper tries to show that the neglect of Gandhian Economics has led to the major problems facing the global economy today.

Many of the problems facing India would be reduced, if not resolved if ethics was considered as an inseparable part of Economics. This is what Gandhi believed and events seem to be proving him right.

Saturday, May 2, 2015

Understanding Gandhi's vision of Swadeshi

By Siby K. Joseph

Satyagraha and swadeshi are fundamental in Gandhi's philosophy of life. According to Gandhi, the whole gamut of man's activities constitutes an indivisible whole. Life cannot be segregated into watertight compartments like social, economic, political, religious and so on. So the ideas and concepts he developed in the course of his relentless experiments with truth was an attempt to integrate the various aspects of life. The concept of swadeshi was not an exception. It was not merely an economic doctrine. In fact the concept of swadeshi covered all aspects of the human life. Gandhi's vision of swadeshi is a universal concept even though he propounded it in the context of India's struggle for freedom. He used swadeshi as a means to achieve India's swaraj. India's struggle for freedom was a source of inspiration for many non-violent struggles in different parts of the globe. Swaraj through swadeshi is a principle of universal application and it can be emulated by people in their struggle for freedom. It was one of the eleven vows Gandhi prescribed for a satygraha way of life. In this paper an attempt has been made to understand Gandhi's concept of swadeshi and its manifestation in important facets of human life. Swadeshi as a generic concept covers almost every aspect of human life, all his ideas, concepts, methods and programmes. However, the scope of the present paper has been limited to areas such as economic, political, social, religious, and educational and health. Firstly, we will analyse Gandhi's vision of swadeshi.